Los Angeles police are tackling a new challenge: firefighting missions

Since the Palisades fires broke out, LAPD officers accustomed to tracking 911 calls and patrolling the city's streets have suddenly found themselves thrust into an unfamiliar but critical role: part aid worker, part night sentry, part Firefighters' wingman, battling one of the most destructive fires in the region's history.

For decades, police officers across the country have been pressed into crisis response duty during wildfires, earthquakes, hurricanes and tornadoes. Some experts predict law enforcement will increasingly face new climate-related challenges, challenges that Los Angeles Police Department officials learned firsthand last week.

The Los Angeles Police Department has been grappling with how and when to enforce evacuation orders and how to conduct routine criminal investigations while short-staffed.

About 750 officers are deployed to fire zones, with the crisis straining a force already well below what leaders say is optimal staffing levels due to long-standing turnover and recruitment issues.

The Los Angeles Police Department's 21 patrol divisions are expected to send additional personnel to the front lines of the fire – patrol officers, supervisors and detectives. As a result, most low-level calls, such as burglaries or other incidents where the suspect has escaped, do not receive immediate attention.

Los Angeles Police Department officers are under pressure to focus on targeting opportunistic burglars who are suspected of using chaos to break into the homes of people fleeing fires.

Earlier this week, prosecutors charged nine people with robberies in the Palisades and Eaton fire-damaged areas, including three who allegedly stole $200,000 worth of valuables from a Mandeville Canyon home. Separately, another man has been charged with intentionally setting a fire at Azusa Park.

Pacific Palisades officers working around evacuation zones have been harshly criticized by frustrated residents eager to return to their homes. Local council offices and social media were flooded with complaints about inaccurate information and inconsistent police enforcement.

During a daily briefing for officers on Tuesday, Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonald said the department was continuing to increase patrols in the area to deter potential thieves. He also asked people displaced by the fires to be patient and “continue to cooperate.”

“We understand your frustration and desire to see your homes with your own eyes, but we cannot allow you to return until Cal Fire tells us that the affected areas are safe to resettle,” McDonald said.

He said the department has received reinforcements from the Los Angeles International Airport and Port Police departments and about 200 National Guard troops. The chief said authorities arrested 14 people on various charges, including curfew violations, impersonating firefighters, drunk driving and burglary. Police also investigated 34 missing persons reports: 20 people were found alive and several others were victims of the Palisades fire.

Firefighters have contained about 19% of the blaze, which has burned 23,713 acres and destroyed nearly 1,300 structures. Officials confirmed that at least nine people died as a result of the fire.

Los Angeles Police Department officers were also among those affected. The homes of 19 officers were destroyed and 11 others suffered fire damage, according to a department-wide memo distributed last week.

The unit is part of a just-announced state and federal task force aimed at combating wildfire-related crimes, including burglaries, arson and flying drones in restricted airspace. Such initiatives and disaster-related policing may become more routine, based on new findings from researchers studying the effects of climate change.

After Hurricane Katrina, several New Orleans police officers were convicted of killing unarmed civilians in the chaotic days after the hurricane and were forced to pay multimillion-dollar settlements, and U.S. police agencies began to train experts more proactively. said, for disaster scenarios.

Law enforcement agencies across the country are watching the Los Angeles Police Department's performance in recent days, said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum.

“Whether you believe it’s the cause of climate change or not, Los Angeles is going to be a wake-up call for everyone,” he said.

In a 2023 paper published in the journal Policing, two Dutch researchers conclude that rising global temperatures and extreme weather are already having a dramatic impact on policing and will continue to do so in unexpected ways this impact.

One of the authors, Anna Matczak, a criminologist and senior lecturer at The Hague University of Applied Sciences, said more climate events “will significantly affect and change crime and injury patterns at every possible level,” This could mean everything from higher crime rates of domestic violence to theft of valuable resources and disaster relief supplies.

“There's ordinary crime, but beyond that there's suddenly been so-called survival crime because people are being deprived of basic needs,” Machak said.

Associate Professor Sylvia Berg, another author of the paper, said some police departments around the world have begun developing climate-specific strategies, analyzing weather data to try to predict when and where crime hotspots will emerge.

Even if some critics don't want to admit it, police already play a vital role in the city's response to disasters, said Los Angeles Police Department Deputy Chief Donald “Donnie” Graham.

“It’s the police who are out there preventing illegal entry into these areas to prevent people from being attacked in the darkest moments,” he said as he drove to the city’s emergency response center.

He defended the way police acted during recent fires, noting that false alerts about evacuations and other conflicting information circulating online made everyone's job harder.

“Chaos is chaos,” Graham said.

A Santa Monica resident whose home was burglarized early Wednesday is hoping the Apple AirTags among her stolen items will help investigators track them down. But authorities told the woman, named Vicky, they “just didn't have enough resources.”

The woman asked that her last name not be used for safety reasons. She said her home is just outside the mandatory evacuation zone set up in Santa Monica as the Palisades Fire spread south on Tuesday. She and her family decided to leave, leaving the house in two vehicles and heading to a safer location. By around 11 p.m., the house was empty.

Vicky, who shared surveillance video of the incident with The Times, said a man broke into the property around 2:30 a.m. In the video, the thief, wearing a dark hoodie and carrying a backpack, appears to kick in the wooden front door before stealing valuables including designer shoes and a collection of Taiwanese whiskey.

“They completely abandoned our house,” she said.

When the thief left the home just after 3 a.m., he took a duffel bag containing an Apple AirTag. Vicky said she and her husband contacted the Santa Monica Police Department and then the Los Angeles Police Department, which began investigating the matter after determining the AirTags were setting off alarms in the city.

Vicki said the LAPD tracked the AirTags to an apartment building in downtown Los Angeles but “could not determine” its location and did not enter the building. The AirTag was later moved to another nearby property where it remained for several days.

Vicky said when she followed up with Santa Monica police, she was told the department didn't have enough resources to pursue the matter because of the fire. She knows the fire is everyone's biggest concern, but she worries time is running out to solve the case.

“If you can find them, you can solve a burglary,” she said.

A spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department did not respond to a request for comment on the case.

Santa Monica police spokesperson Lt. Erika Aklufi said in a statement that “under normal circumstances,” detectives would work to track down the owners of stolen AirTags and other devices. But these clues don't always lead to a location or sufficient evidence. Make an arrest.

“We remain deeply involved in a highly extraordinary emergency during which nothing has returned to the status quo,” Aklufi said in a statement, noting that “every official, including those assigned to Officers conducting the investigation are being asked to temporarily put aside their normal duties to coordinate with employees at the Santa Monica evacuation zone. “

The statement said handling the fire remains a top priority, but Vicki's AirTag case remains open.

“The investigation is not over,” Santa Monica police said. “As we continue to move forward and move closer to normalcy, our investigative divisions will continue to work with the LAPD to pursue appropriate follow-up actions as time and resources allow.”

Times staff writer Richard Winton contributed to this report.